Meta Is Killing Its Spark Engine, Essentially Admitting Smartphone AR Is Dead
Meta is killing its Spark AR platform.
Spark Studio, available for Windows and Mac, is the engine used to create smartphone AR effects and experiences for the camera in Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger. It was launched in 2019.
From January 14 Meta says Spark Studio will stop working, and all effects made with it will be unpublished from Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger.
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Leaked video from January, showing that Spark was once intended to be the engine for Quest Augments.
Since 2021 it’s been possible for developers to test their Spark AR effects and experiences inside Quest headsets using Meta Spark Player for Quest.
Originally, Meta even planned for Spark to be the engine used to create Augments, the widget-like “persistent spatially-anchored digital objects” feature for Quest 3 that the company announced when launching the headset at Connect 2023. This could be seen in videos leaked in January. The Information also reported that Meta planned to support these Spark-powered Augments on its eventual true AR glasses, a strategy that would have allowed Quest 3 and newer headsets to act as affordable development kits for them.
But in June Meta’s CTO Andrew Bosworth revealed that the Augments feature for Quest was heavily delayed because the technical architecture “wasn’t good enough” and that Meta went “back to the drawing board”, suggesting the company no longer planned to use Spark for Augments.
David Heaney
In the FAQ for Spark’s shutdown, Meta seems to hint that the decision is being taken so that it can build a new AR platform more suited for headsets and glasses, without the legacy of (or need to support) smartphones:
Is Meta still committed to AR and the metaverse?
Definitely. Meta is committed to our long-term investments in new computing platforms that will bring us beyond today’s 2D experiences on mobile. With the decision to shut down the Meta Spark platform, we’re also shifting resources to the next generation of experiences, across new form factors like glasses.
It’s currently unknown what Meta’s new plan for the technical architecture of Horizon OS Augments and apps for its AR glasses is. But the company’s goal is likely to deliver apps that can efficiently run alongside each other and 2D apps, just like Apple Vision Pro apps can in the visionOS Shared Space. Currently 3D apps on Quest are fully siloed and cannot run alongside others, and this limits the platform’s spatial multitasking potential.
